Ten Thousand Times
by cfn
Summary: She wonders why she didn't sense it earlier. Perhaps because she's so tired.
1. A Lesser Lorelai

**Disclaimer: I own nothing of this show**

**Ten Thousand Times**

**It begins to snow.**

**She wonders why she didn't sense it earlier.**

**Perhaps because she's so tired. **

**It seems like months since she's had a full night's sleep. **

**Perhaps because it usually doesn't snow this early in the season.**

**Perhaps because it's late at night, or early in the morning depending on your viewpoint.**

**Perhaps.**

**She looked out the window, taking in the sparkling crystals in the glow from the streetlight.**

**They fell, with a light wind drifting them toward the town.**

**The first snow of the season. **

**The first snow since the break-up.**

**The first snow since she'd married.**

**The first snow.**

**Tradition.**

**She had to get up and walk in it, if only for a minute.**

**She quietly arose from the bed so as not to wake him.**

**She kept to her side of the bed, him to his.**

**When he awoke and got up she never instinctively reached to confirm his lose.**

**She only did that with Luke.**

**Why did she remember that?**

**If only Rory was here. **

**That would be perfect.**

**She'd wake her and they'd walk in the first snow.**

**There would be smiles and memories of their first snow walks.**

**Snow was magical.**

**It had powers only she could comprehend.**

**All good things happen when it snows.**

**Magic.**

**She quietly exited the bedroom and went down the stairs. **

**She saw her dog, Paul Anka, sleeping on the sofa .**

**If Chris saw him on it he'd yell, but Paul Anka was quite aware now of who was descending the staircase.**

**Paul Anka now kept away from Chris as much as possible, hiding behind the sofa or chairs or anything that could keep him at a distance.**

**He now seemed to fear Chris as much as peas or a wristwatch.**

**She didn't remember when this started, but she'd noticed it, and wondered why?**

**Maybe just another one of his quirks. **

**Say that inwardly, no q words out loud.**

**She put on a coat and shoes and walked onto the porch. **

**She looked out and marveled how picturesque everything had become.**

**Snow gives the world a calm and peace unlike anything else, she thought.**

**It truly is magical.**

**Hopefully, she thought, this too was a magical snow.**

**She looked toward the sky as the snowflakes fell on her face.**

"**_Welcome friends_", she said aloud.**

**Tradition.**

**Then she began walking, just walking in the snow.**

**She found herself at the town gazebo, again. **

**She comes here quite often lately.**

**She walked up into it, sat down, and looked across the square at the diner and then toward the apartment windows above.**

**It had been months since she'd set foot in there. **

**Months since she'd had a great cup of coffee. **

**Her coffee intake had lessened over this time, not because she had lost her craving for it, but because no matter who made it, it just wasn't as good. **

**She smiled thinking that Luke would think her caffeine consumption being lessened was a good thing.**

**It wasn't.**

**It was becoming a dieing tradition for her.**

**She stopped smiling.**

**Her thoughts went to the first time they'd run into each other after the wedding.**

**He offered his congratulations.**

**She thanked him.**

**He began to walk away.**

"**_Hey Luke_?", she asked.**

**He turned.**

"**_Yeh_?"**

"**_Would it be o.k. if I came back to the diner_?", she said with a hopeful look in her eye and a small smile.**

**He looked everywhere but at her, looking for an escape to the question, but there was no place to hide.**

**He looked at her wedding ring.**

**He took a breath.**

"**_I don't think that'd be a good idea_," and began to walk away again.**

"**_Why_?", pleading, smile gone.**

**He turned and looked around again, not at her.**

"**_I just don't think it would be_.", and turned again.**

"**_Why_?" hurt.**

**She only pressed Luke this way. **

**Why was that?**

**He turned once more and looked directly in her eyes, after a moment he spoke.**

"**_Because_," he said, "_You make me feel like I'm not worth anything to anybody….and I really don't like that feeling_," and then walked off.**

**She began to get cold and looked up at the windows again.**

**How nice it would be to go into the diner now and get a hot cup of coffee.**

**Not so long ago she would have banged on the door or yelled up to his apartment for him to come down and make her coffee, and he would have, accompanied by an appropriate rant.**

**The lights in the apartment came on. **

**Must be early deliveries today.**

**She hoped to catch a glimpse of him, but he didn't appear.**

**After a few minutes, it was time to go. **

**She was really cold now.**

**As she started home the snow turned to sleet and the wind picked up. **

**It stung her face and eyes and the wind was bone chilling through her damp clothes.**

**She thought she should have dressed more weather appropriate.**

**She was cold.**

**Cold.**

"**_I slept with Christopher_," she remembered.**

**His look said it probably would have been kinder to stick a knife in his gut and twist it, then he took off in anger.**

**It was she. **

**She made him feel like less. **

**No one else. **

**Just her.**

**She also noticed the reactions of the town toward her.**

**It was now civil, not friendly or polite. **

**Quick waves, forced smiles, and excuses to leave for some thing or another.**

**Few words spoken to her at town meetings. **

**No more asking for her help in the many insane town pageants or school productions.**

**No interest in her comings or goings by the gossips.**

**Even Sookie, her best friend and business partner had been trying to avoid her lately. **

**Something always coming up in the kitchen or something with the kids or Jackson.**

**Rory even seemed to avoid her. **

**Always saying she was studying or something with the paper.**

**Something.**

**Her visits home were cordial but she left quickly to go see Lane and how her pregnancy was coming along, as good an excuse as any.**

**No more movie nights, another tradition dieing.**

**Her parents seemed to be the only ones made happy by her choice, especially her mother, but to everyone else she had become less important.**

**It was by her choice. **

**She was the one who chose to ambush Luke that night and give him the ultimatum. She was the one who chose to sleep with Christopher the same night without even returning the engagement ring. **

**Her choice was Christopher, not Luke.**

**Choice.**

**Luke had asked for time, no different when she did when things weren't right with Rory.**

**He was just trying to make things right with April.**

**The only time he had ever asked her for anything important to him. **

**How come she saw it so differently then?**

**Why didn't she jump in and not let him do things that way?**

**She should have immediately made her presence known to April and told Luke in no uncertain terms that they were a team, no matter what Anna said.**

**He would have accepted her viewpoint.**

**She should have been all in.**

**She wasn't all in though, and had the sneaking suspicion that Luke knew that too, and that's why he did what he did.**

**Was April her excuse to sabotage the whole engagement?**

**Was she blaming a thirteen year old girl who only wanted to know her father, and he who only wanted to know his daughter?**

**Was this the out she was looking for, and the reason to believe Luke no longer wanted her?**

**Why was she even looking for an out?**

**Christopher.**

**The son of wealthy blue-bloods with the stamp of approval on him from her parents.**

**The one they relentlessly tried to force on her, year in and year out, because, after all, it was the right thing to do.**

**The one that was worthy of her. **

**The one they conspired with to destroy her relationship with Luke; Emily and Christopher with sledgehammers, Richard with slow poison.**

**Never there when she tried to be her own person and raise her daughter to be strong **

**and independent.**

**Never there when she scrubbed toilets and scraped change off the dressers to make ends meet.**

**The one who pursued his Peter Pan lifestyle while she struggled.**

**Never there to watch Rory when she was young and worked double shifts.**

**It was good when after school she knew Rory would wait for her at Luke's.**

**She never had to worry for her safety, because for years Luke watched over her.**

**Yet, she always let Christopher back in.**

**Was he that charming?**

**Was it because of obligation? **

**Did she never outgrow her teenage crush on him?**

**Is that why she slept with him every time he came back and confessed his love for her?**

**Christopher, the one who made her break promises to others, the one who made promises only to break them, the one that made her lie.**

**When it came to Christopher, she listened to her head instead of her heart.**

**She gave in to the wishes of her parents and she thought Rory too.**

**Her chance to have the whole package.**

**She married him. **

**Now everyone around her could be happy.**

**Rory's relationship with Logan, another one of good breeding, and her marriage to Christopher had returned them both to the blue-blood fold, much to the delight of her parents.**

**Now, here she was, married to the boy who impregnated her at sixteen.**

**The deadbeat no-show father who only came around when his other relationships failed.**

**Never there when she or Rory really needed him.**

**He said he had changed, he hadn't.**

**He had money, only through inheritance.**

**He had the breeding that meant so much to her mother., breeding was her mother's code word for money. **

**That was the most important thing to Emily, because only good and worthy people have money, the rest be damned.**

**He said she was the only one for him, she wasn't.**

**He was not all in, and neither was she, again.**

**Why was she thinking like this about Christopher?**

**Luke.**

**Because, when her world crashed, only Luke was ever there to pick up the pieces.**

**He was the one she turned to when it all went wrong.**

**He was the one who could fix it.**

**He was always there.**

**The one that truly loved her.**

**She knows that now.**

**Her smile never had its' desired effect on Christopher, it only worked on Luke.**

**Christopher sees her insistence on doing certain things as nagging, Luke had seen it as flirting.**

**She doesn't smile much anymore, she doesn't flirt at all.**

**When things go wrong at the house or the inn, it's electricians or plumbers or handymen who have to be called now.**

**Just do the job and leave, and make damn sure they get paid.**

**It's not Luke and Bert who save the day now.**

**She knows that fixing things for her was his way of saying he loved her.**

**He said he loved her by giving her coffee, pancakes, burgers, pie, or whatever she was in the mood for.**

**He said he loved her when he tried to get her to eat something healthier.**

**He said he loved her when he always seemed to do the things she wanted to do, whether he wanted to or not.**

**He said he loved her when she knew he would have given her everything he had to make her dreams come true.**

**He said he loved her by every action, touch, and word.**

**He must've said he loved her ten thousand times.**

**Everything in her life seems to be broken now.**

**Luke would know how to fix it.**

**Luke can fix anything, a broken sink, or even a broken Lorelai, but he was broken too. **

**She broke him, about as bad as anyone could be broken, and she didn't know how to fix a broken Luke.**

**Broken.**

**Dreams.**

**When she sleeps she dreams of him. **

**She still dreams about having children with him.**

**She has no such dreams of Christopher, awake or asleep.**

**She doesn't dream of Christopher at all.**

**Now at home she's frozen.**

**Discarding her wet clothes, she towels her hair dry, warms up, and quietly walks upstairs, careful again not to wake Christopher, and returns to her side of the bed.**

**She lays her head on her pillow, on her side of the bed.**

**Silently her tears begin to fall.**

**She is less to all around her.**

**Less because of the things she's done.**

**Less to those that have loved her the most.**

**Less.**

**Her smiles, her flirting, her magical snow walks, her coffee drinking, donuts, movie nights, her traditions, they're dieing, and the person she was is dieing with them.**

**She thinks of Luke.**

**She hopes to sleep and dream of magical snows where Luke will fix things just for her and their blue-eyed, dark-haired children.**

**Her last thought before unconsciousness is:**

_**The snow has lost its' magic.**_

**It begins to rain.**

**A/N: This is probably a one shot. **

**I'll just read the stories you guys do so much better than myself.**

**Anyway, hit the blue button below if you want.**

**Go ahead, it's not a self-destruct button……..or is it?**

**Only one way to find out.**

**I hear Tom Rush singing in the background:**

_**I know your leaving's too long overdue**_

_**For far too long I've had nothing new to show to you**_

_**Goodbye dry eyes **_

_**I watched your plane**_

_**Fade off west of the moon**_

_**And it felt so strange, to walk away alone**_

_**No regrets**_

_**No tears goodbye**_

_**Don't want ya' back**_

_**We'd only cry again**_

_**Say goodbye again**_

**I wish you all well and hope that you find the love of your life.**

**Thanks for reading.**

**CFN**


	2. A Lost Luke

**Disclaimer: I own nothing of this show.**

**Ten Thousand Times**

**It begins to snow.**

**He lays in bed and looks out the window taking in the falling flakes as they seemed to come down directly onto the diner.**

**It wasn't in the forecast. **

**Another one missed by the weathermen.**

**Another first snow.**

**Another sleepless night.**

**She wouldn't miss it though.**

**She knew it was coming.**

**She'd be happy.**

**Her magical snow.**

**Good things must be happening for her now.**

**He wondered if she would drag Christopher out of bed to experience a magical snow with her?**

**He wondered if she would explain its' significance to him?**

**He wondered if he'd share her enthusiasm about it, unlike him.?**

**He wondered if he already knew what he knew about snow?**

**Her friends were here.**

**Maybe, he should get up and walk in it for a moment, and say hello to her friends.**

**Why did he think that?**

**Maybe it was somehow he could be closer to her.**

**Maybe he just wanted to relive good memories of a better time.**

**Maybe he needed some magic in his life.**

**Maybe the snow would become magical for him.**

**Maybe because he had a long ride ahead of him today, and needed to wake up.**

**Maybe.**

**He should get up and get ready. **

**He switched on the bed lamp, then he rolled onto his back and stared at the ceiling.**

**It had been months since he'd seen her.**

**Months since she'd begged and flirted for coffee.**

**Months since he'd seen her smile.**

**Months of hurt and emptiness.**

**Months.**

**A random encounter on the street.**

**Congratulations on her wedding.**

**A quick thank you.**

**He had to get away.**

"**_You make me feel like I'm not worth anything to anybody...and I really don't like that feeling"._**

**He hoped he hurt her as bad as she hurt him.**

**He hoped her life was miserable.**

**He hoped he mad her feel as worthless as she made him feel.**

**He hoped he made her cry.**

**He hoped she was o.k.**

**He got up and went to the bathroom to get ready.**

**He shaved regularly now.**

**He wore something other than flannel shirts and jeans sometimes.**

**He went without his cap quite a bit now, but he'd wear it today.**

"**_I slept with Christopher", _he remembered.**

**He couldn't hurt her anywheres near as bad as she hurt him.**

**At least the townsfolk still liked him.**

**They still came in and smiled and made small talk.**

**They genuinely seemed to like April too.**

**Lorelai's name never came up though.**

**It was probably a good idea.**

**He still asked about Rory though and they enthusiastically told him what they knew.**

**They knew he'd appreciate it, and he did.**

**He came out of the bathroom and began to heat up some water for tea.**

**He looked out the window at the square and then toward the gazebo.**

**The snow had turned to sleet.**

**It must be cold out, he should warm up the truck.**

**He walked to the closet and noticed that April had left her jacket there.**

_**I'm sure she has another at home,**_** he thought.**

**April.**

**The daughter from left field.**

**Secretly hidden from him for years.**

**Hidden because Anna thought he didn't want children.**

**Hidden because she thought he'd be a bad father.**

**How could he be a bad father when he worshiped his own father?**

**He had his role model.**

**The one he still mourns to this day.**

**April.**

**The one he secretly hid from Lorelai.**

**Hidden because he wanted a relationship with her.**

**Hidden because he was afraid.**

**Hidden because he was ashamed.**

**Hidden because he was not all in.**

**The bone of contention between them.**

**The one they fought over.**

**The one that caused the breakup?**

**No.**

**Lorelai was not all in either.**

**She was the one that hid her dealings with Christopher.**

**She was the one that lied.**

**She was the one to issue the ultimatum.**

**She was the one who cheated.**

**She was the one that didn't want him.**

**She was the one who ended it.**

**He shut her out though.**

**He didn't tell her immediately.**

**He wasn't up front and honest.**

**He should have let her in.**

**He would have listened to her and followed her advice.**

**Why did he do it that way?**

**Why did he let her walk away?**

**She ran to Christopher.**

**He could give her all the things she wanted.**

**He could give her romantic getaways.**

**He could give her expensive jewelry and cars.**

**He could give her the relationship she wanted.**

**Christopher could give her her family back.**

**He couldn't do all that.**

**He could only fix a broken sink for her.**

**He could only give her homemade jewelry and second hand engagement rings.**

**He could only give her flowers.**

**He could only pour her coffee and serve her burgers, pie and donuts.**

**He could only give her the things she wanted to do.**

**That was all he had to give.**

**He finishes his tea and goes down and starts the truck.**

**He scrapes some ice from the windshield and gets back in.**

**He pulls out and starts driving.**

**He hopes he remembers the directions he was given.**

**He hopes he doesn't get lost, but he was lost.**

**He was alone and drifting without her.**

**She was the one that gave him direction.**

**Her smile was the sun that lit up his day.**

**He should have told her he loved her.**

**He should have told her he loved her smile.**

**He should have told her he loved her laugh.**

**He should have told her he loved her coffee drinking.**

**He should have told her he loved her for loving him.**

**He should have told her he loved her ten thousand times.**

**He pulls onto the interstate and thinks:**

_**I hope the snow was magical for Lorelai.**_

**It begins to rain.**

**A/N: Obviously not a one shot.**

**I want to thank all those that reviewed the last chapter. Very kind. Very encouraging.**

**I hope you like this one as well.**

**I hear Vince Gill singing in the background.**

_**Why do I**_

_**Choose the things I choose**_

_**Why do I**_

_**Always find some lame excuse**_

_**Why do I**_

_**Not realize what I could lose.**_

_**Oh, I wish I knew the reason why.**_

_**Why do you**_

_**Get that sad look on your face**_

_**Why do you**_

_**Pull away from my embrace**_

_**Why do you **_

_**See all my faults and mistakes**_

_**Oh, I wish you knew the reason why.**_

_**Why do we treat each other like we do**_

_**It's like we never even tried.**_

_**Why can't we get back to the love we knew**_

_**Oh why oh baby why.**_

**Thanks for reading again.**

**CFN**


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